Nov. 19 is this year's Great American Smokeout. Since the Surgeon General identified the dangers of smoking, Americans have gradually quit, yet about 1 in 5 Americans still smoke. The Centers for Disease Control estimates that about 4,000 young adolescents start smoking every day and 6 percent of middle school students are smokers. If ever there were a time to think about quitting smoking, it's now. (more)
Penn State Mont Alto announced receipt of three major gifts totaling more than $1.1 million to benefit its students at its 14th annual scholarship reception. The event, sponsored by Waste Management, gives students the opportunity to meet and thank the benefactors of their scholarships. (more)
Penn State Mont Alto has received a one-of-a-kind collection from Penn State football enthusiast and Mont Alto friend John Miner. During the 1972 football season, Citizens Bank of Pennsylvania (then known as Central Counties Bank) first issued a unique booster button for every Nittany Lion football game. Miner has collected them all and they are now proudly displayed in Conklin Hall. (more)
Physics professor Mike Doncheski has added to his responsibilities this semester. He was recently named the campus' new assistant chief academic officer. In addition to teaching courses and coaching Mont Alto's cross country team, Doncheski now provides administrative oversight for the campus' adjunct faculty members. (more)
The Rock Ethics Institute in Penn State's College of the Liberal Arts is seeking nominations for University students who have exhibited ethical leadership. Any faculty, staff, student or community member may nominate a student for the 2010 Stand Up Award. (more)
About 23.6 million Americans have diabetes and another 54 million are at risk to develop the disease. As these numbers continue to increase, Diabetes Awareness Month, observed throughout November, is more important than ever. Diabetes, a disease in which the body can't regulate the amount of sugar in the blood, currently affects about 8 percent of the population, a number that is increasing rapidly, according to this week's edition of The Medical Minute, a service of the Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center. (more)
On Nov. 9, USA Today -- the nation's top-selling newspaper -- in cooperation with Penn State launched a new e-Edition for Penn State students as part of the University's continuing mission to promote newspaper reading as a way of integrating real world with classroom study. Since 1997, Penn State has had a readership program in place -- the first of its kind in the nation and a model for more than 500 collegiate readership programs nationwide. (more)
A new article in The Penn Stater magazine tells the story of the unheralded 1946 and 1947 Nittany Lion football squads -- two teams that helped establish Penn State nationally as a top program and, more importantly, made the University a key factor in the nation's slow march to racial justice. The men who made up those two teams are widely thought to have inspired the University's iconic "We Are..." chant. Read more, and download a copy of the story from the magazine's November-December issue, at The Penn Stater blog: http://tinyurl.com/yzrp5ua online.
Earlier this year, Penn State Live also paid tribute to the teams. Watch the story of the "game that wasn't," when the entire Penn State football team refused to play at the segregated Orange Bowl in 1946, at http://live.psu.edu/youtube/OoCbPyPlfls online. Hear from Wally Triplett himself as he talks about being first African-American to play in the Cotton Bowl in 1947. (more)
Autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are neurodevelopmental disorders marked by impaired social interactions, restricted interests, repetitive behaviors, and communication impairment, which persist throughout a person's lifetime. The ASD prevalence rate--the number of individuals diagnosed with autism--has been steadily increasing over time. A new report from the U.S. Department of Health's Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), based on a phone survey of over 78,000 families, set the prevalence rate at nearly one in 91 children. This is an increase from the prior statistic of one in 150 children reported in 2007 by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says The Medical Minute, a service of the Penn State Hershey Medical Center. (more)
When plum pox was discovered in Adams County peach trees in October 1999 -- the first time the disease had been found in North America -- the nation's stone-fruit growers watched anxiously to see how Pennsylvania would respond. As the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture officially lifted the quarantine of the area's stone fruit Oct. 29 -- certifying the state as plum-pox free -- James Travis reflected on the 10-year, collaborative eradication effort and the agricultural catastrophe it averted. The virus threatened to wipe out the state's $25 million annual production of peaches, plums, apricots, nectarines and cherries. (more)
